First, the statement says that the day after President Obama announced sanctions in response to Russian efforts to interfere with the 2016 election, Flynn called a “senior official of the Presidential Transition Team (PTT)” who was with other “senior members of the PTT” at Mar-a-Lago. On the call, Flynn and the “senior official” said that they did not want Russia to “escalate the situation.” Flynn called the Russian ambassador “immediately after” his call with the senior official to communicate the incoming administration’s request. The next day, Putin announced that Russia would not retaliate against the United States, and the Russian ambassador later informed Flynn that Putin had decided not to retaliate in response to his request.

Second, the statement also says that Flynn initiated contact with Russia and other foreign governments in an effort to influence a U.N. Security Council vote on an Egyptian resolution condemning Israeli settlements. Flynn made these calls at the behest of a “very senior member” of the PTT. In this instance, Flynn was unsuccessful. The Russian ambassador told Flynn that “Russia would not vote against the resolution.”

Third, the statement briefly outlines false statements Flynn made about his relationship with the government of Turkey. These false statements appear unrelated to any dealings with Russia, in any capacity.

That is not happening in Flynn’s situation. Instead, like Papadopoulos, he is being permitted to plead guilty to a mere process crime. A breaking report from ABC News indicates that Flynn is prepared to testify that Trump directed him to make contact with the Russians — initially to lay the groundwork for mutual efforts against ISIS in Syria. That, however, is exactly the sort of thing the incoming national-security adviser is supposed to do in a transition phase between administrations. If it were part of the basis for a “collusion” case arising out of Russia’s election meddling, then Flynn would not be pleading guilty to a process crime — he’d be pleading guilty to an espionage conspiracy.

Understand: If Flynn’s conversations with the Russian ambassador had evinced the existence of a quid pro quo collusion arrangement — that the Trump administration would ease or eliminate sanctions on Russia as a payback for Russia’s cyber-espionage against the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic party — it would have been completely appropriate, even urgently necessary, for the Obama Justice Department to investigate Flynn. But if that had happened, Mueller would not be permitting Flynn to settle the case with a single count of lying to FBI agents. Instead, we would be looking at a major conspiracy indictment, and Flynn would be made to plead to far more serious offenses if he wanted a deal — cooperation in exchange for sentencing leniency.

To the contrary, for all the furor, we have a small-potatoes plea in Flynn’s case — just as we did in Papadopoulos’s case, despite extensive “collusion” evidence. Meanwhile, the only major case Mueller has brought, against former Trump-campaign chairman Paul Manafort and an associate, has nothing to do with the 2016 election. It is becoming increasingly palpable that, whatever “collusion” means, there was no actionable, conspiratorial complicity by the Trump campaign in the Kremlin’s machinations.

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So, at the end of the day, we may well end up with multiple senior members of the administration facing prison time for covering up no crime and no collusion, just contacts. If that’s justice, it’s a form of justice that will leave no one standing on the political high ground and partisans on both sides seething with rage and bitterness.